


coming home in reverse

by sshomoerotica



Series: TWD Rickyl Drabbles [2]
Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-27
Updated: 2017-11-27
Packaged: 2019-02-07 07:54:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12836649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sshomoerotica/pseuds/sshomoerotica
Summary: They know each other with the inherent knowledge of another human being, gained by virtue of having learned each other so well.





	coming home in reverse

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shinobitrash](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shinobitrash/gifts).



> dedicated to [ash!](http://archiveofourown.org/users/shinobitrash) because they're the one who got me into this pairing and it is total pain and suffering
> 
> this is the most pretentious shit ever but i wrote it and now i like it and everything else i want to write for this pairing _(divorce!AU, wolf!Daryl AU, high school!AU)_ is too big so have this

* * *

* * *

 

 

Rick breathes easier with Daryl around. There's the way Daryl trusts Rick, not blindly but implicitly, warm and dangerous. It's the way they look at each other, no words necessary; entire sentences conveyed in a glance. The warmth and strength of their bodies as they lean against a wall and watch their people but slowly slide towards each other, strong shoulder to strong shoulder. It's the little smiles, the soft-spoken jokes, the huffs of something that was once raucous laughter but is no less joyful for its quieting.

They know each other with the inherent knowledge of another human being, gained by virtue of having learned each other so well. Rick had forgotten and Daryl had never known the way two people can so effortlessly exist in the same space; not moving to _avoid_ each other but filling the gaps. Both of them winding together like mangrove roots and thrumming like hot summer cicadas.

An ally, a friend -- a brother in everything-but-blood, a brother in ways Daryl never knew before. Family with something deeper, something  _earned_ and not God-given. A trust forged in the fires of Hell this world has become. A thread of unbreakable steel, untouchable to those outside; but underneath lies malleable gold that molds easily to a warm touch. 

Daryl wouldn't know what to do with it, if it had a name and form. If it went from some vague thing to a _noun_ , solid and real in the world. Now all it is is warmth, a different kind of happiness and a dangerous, delicate hope blossoming in a bleak, cold, unforgiving landscape. He carries it close to him, nestles it deep in his chest where is it tucked safe beneath his ribs. A secret; a treasure; a feeling he's never known before, not like this - so pure and gentle. _Love,_ or something like it that for the first time isn't born of lashes and ultimatums.

Rick doesn't _want_ to name it. He shies from it, turning his head like a shy dog in order to barely see it from the corner of his eye. He can't help this sort of thing from reminding him of Lori - thoughts and emotions that only ever belonged to _her_. _It's wrong_ , part of him whines. _Wrong_ to feel this way again, to feel ripples of these feelings now directed at someone new. Still he knows he would be nothing without it; a husk, long abandoned and dried in the sun like an old carcass, bones picked clean by carrion birds. With this he has a font of strength to brace against, to raise him up and keep those wheels turning for a bit longer. 

It's all in the little things. The brush of dry backs of hands when they stand or walk too close; the finishing of sentences; the reading of thoughts. The seamless way they move on a hunt, silent. Rick finds himself giving over power so easily to Daryl in this, who when he is stalking through the trees has never been more in his comfort zone. The way eyes follow the carved line of a cheekbone; map the concave gaping maw of ribs-to-belly; the swath of dirt and sweat caked on the nape of the neck; quite rasping sounds made when a hand rubs tiredly over stubble slowly turning into a beard.

It needn't be anything more than this, Daryl thinks, as the bloody sunset anoints Rick with a crown. He could live for this alone; _this_ , and the soft tired laughter, the settle of bones into a chair at night around a campfire. The sweet and faded cracked-china-plate blue of those eyes ringed with laugh-lines, and the curls growing overlong and slowly watching dusty grey overwhelming remnants of warm brown. He tracks every exhale, every inhale, every blink.

Rick knows he can keep fighting for _this_. He can stand strong again, with that crossbow-string-tight stance at his back. He can rest easy so long as those feral eyes track him and that chin tilts, proud. He knows those marks of dirt across those shoulders, those golden arms made of nothing but pure cabled muscle. Rick's fingers know very knob of that spine, curving up through sun-warped skin. Hidden beneath armor of leather with wings lie the mention of scars, private and shy things that reveal themselves piecemeal; puckered ribbons of skin and thin, shiny lines.

It isn't anything, to anyone watching. It's a subtle thing, as easy and natural as breathing. Eyes on the outside see nothing, know nothing.

But it is everything to the two hearts that beat, blood singing and restless. It is all that could be hoped for in a world that slowly burns and eats itself alive, rotting away but for glimmers of something beautiful. It is delicate and iridescent like dragonfly wings, so fast and fleeting as to be treasured every time they catch the light.

No one outside sees it; no one who matters. But to _them_ , it is as obvious as the blinding sun and just as necessary. Just as timeless as its setting and rising. _This_ , they know, is what the world still turns for.

**Author's Note:**

> for once the title isn't a song lyric! it is however a misread song title + band that my brain mashed up when a song was playing. does that count?


End file.
